The comment by Gazprom Official Representative Sergey Kupriyanov on the mass media allegations about Yukos’ central office acquisition in the interest of Gazprom Group:

“Prana, the buyer of Yukos’ central office via an auction procedure, is neither affiliated with Gazprom Group, nor has acted in our interests.

Gazprom is a public company and acquires assets in a maximally transparent way strictly congruent with the legislative requirements.

The same policy is pursued as regards the sale of Yukos assets being of interest for Gazprom Group – we have avowed our interest in purchasing those assets both when entering into the call option agreements with Lot 2 auction winner EniNeftegaz and holding the direct talks in July 2006 with then-Yukos President Steven Theede”.